The New Zealand Survey

On Self Misery.—An Epigram

On Self Misery.—An Epigram.

Do pity the wretch who can have no enjoyment,Unless from the help of another;Whose addle mind him finds no native employmentAdapted heart-sorrows to smother:For then, he’s afflicted with worst of all evils,That e’er o’er the wretched could come;His ways would declare, he is haunted by devils,Which make of his misery the “sum!”

Society; Imagination; JoyWhile, how to escape from himself, is a querry;Oft making him rush into woe!—Or dreaming ’tis “life” to be thoughtlessly merry,The pleasures of peace to forego;How fatal such dreaming!—a snare, the inventionOf foes the most cruel, though sly;False joys they would offer with blandest pretension,Whose aim is the soul to destroy!